CHAPTER LVI.



On my Thursday holidays during the winter, after having finished
my duties and accomplished all my school tasks, I felt the greatest
homesickness when I mounted to my museum. It was always a little late
when I finished my lessons, and the light was usually fading when I
looked down at the great meadows that appeared inexpressibly melancholy
as they stretched before me enwrapped in a grayish-pink mist. I was
homesick for the summer, homesick for the sun and the south, all of
which were suggested by the butterflies from my uncle's garden that I
had arranged and pinned under glass, and by the mountain fossils that
the little Peyrals and I had collected in the summer time.

It was a foretaste of that longing for somewhere else which later, after
my return from long voyages to tropical countries, spoiled my visits to
my home.

Oh! there was in particular the pinkish-yellow butterfly! There were
times when I experienced a bitter pleasure in seeking to understand the
great sadness that it caused me. It was in the glass case at the far
end of the room; its two colors so fresh and unusual, like a Chinese
painting, or a fairy's robe, were exquisite foils for each other; the
butterfly formed a luminous whole that shone out brightly in the gray
twilight, and it caused the other butterflies surrounding it to look as